Mr. Schulkin received a Bachelor of Arts degree in Speech Communication from the University of Illinois in Champaign-Urbana in 1992. He received his Juris Doctorate from IIT-Chicago Kent College of Law in 1995. Mr. Schulkin started his legal career working for a few years at a defense firm, allowing him to see firsthand how risk managers and insurance representatives analyzed claims and defenses, including what factors increased settlement value and potential trial exposure. He has utilized this experience over the years to anticipate and overcome possible defenses to major injury cases and to maximize his clients' legal recoveries.

Mr. Schulkin has been profiled as one of the top civil trial lawyers in Illinois by the Leading Lawyers' Network and is a Martindale-Hubbell Top Rated Lawyer in Chicago for Ethical Standards and Legal Ability in obtaining an AV Preeminent Peer-Review rating, the highest rating possible. Since 2002, Mr. Schulkin has served as co-author of the Illinois Institute for Continuing Legal Education (IICLE) handbook, Illinois Civil Discovery Practice, Chapter 4, Production of Documents and Other Tangible Things, including all supplements and updates.

He is a member of the Illinois Trial Lawyers Association (ITLA), Chicago Bar Association (CBA), American Association for Justice (AAJ), Illinois State Bar Association (ISBA), Public Justice, The Society of Trial Lawyers and the Decalogue Society of Lawyers. Mr. Schulkin has served as a mentor for new lawyers through the Decalogue Society of Lawyers and has provided countless hours of pro bono legal services to those in need.

He is a former member of the Board of Directors of the Jewish Council for Youth Services (JCYS), a not-for-profit charitable organization, the Medical Research Junior Board Foundation (MRJBF) of Children's Memorial Hospital (now Lurie Children's Hospital), and the Falcons Hockey Association Board of Directors. In 2014, Mr. Schulkin was awarded the Falcons Hockey Association Parent of the Year. He has been married for more than twenty years and has two children.

Record of Success

Obtained a result of several million dollars for a client after successfully arguing that the client's strokes were not timely diagnosed and treated in a hospital emergency room;

Used phone records and an orthopedic surgeon's office policies to demonstrate that a 30-year-old man who died of a pulmonary embolism following knee replacement surgery had not had his post-operative complaints properly addressed, leading to a significant seven-figure recovery for his widow and young children;

Secured a settlement for the full amount of a gynecologist's insurance coverage by demonstrating that the gynecologist should have provided his patient, who suffered urinary complications from a hysterectomy, with less invasive treatment options before performing the procedure;

Defeated local government tort immunity defenses to secure a successful result at mediation on behalf of a high school football player who suffered a permanent knee injury during football practice;

Obtained a seven-figure recovery on behalf of a drywall laborer who experienced a permanent back injury during construction of a building after stepping on two pieces of unbound, loose copper plumbing pipe that had been left in a hallway;

Negotiated a life-changing pre-trial settlement on behalf of a young man whose vehicle struck a hole in the road and crashed, after Mr. Schulkin's persistent efforts during discovery found evidence that the hole was not simply a pothole due to weather, but was possibly created by municipal employees who had worked in the area;

After a 32-year-old man was killed while installing low-voltage electrical wiring in a retail store, Mr. Schulkin helped demonstrate that the man had suffered an electrical shock from high-voltage wiring that had been left uncapped and exposed in the ceiling, causing him to fall from his ladder to his death, leading to a recovery that provided financial security for the man's widow and their young son.